According to recent studies, wear of disk brake pads currently accounts for around 20% of the particles emitted by road traffic. During a braking action, the friction between the pads and the disks causes the ejection of a quantity of fine particles which are at least as hazardous and toxic, in particular for human health, as the particles emitted by exhaust systems.
Furthermore, these particles are emitted by all types of vehicles (cars, trucks, buses, metro trains, trains, trams etc.) irrespective of their propulsion method (petrol or diesel engines, or electric).
Despite this finding, at present there are no technical solutions likely to lead, reliably and for an acceptable implementation cost, to a significant limitation of the amount of particles emitted by these friction braking elements of disk brake systems.